Road less traveled
by Zoraya Windwalker
Summary: Who are you now, little girl? Now, when all is said and done?


Well, this is a first. Not only have I never written for Cowboy Bebop before, but also never for any Manga/Anime. It's just a tiny little Oneshot, but I still hope you like it.

What else… oh yeah: Thanks to my lovely beta myTme (Check out her own CB fanfiction – they are great!). Not only for the betareading, but also for the title. I couldn't think of one AT ALL. So she suggested this one. It's from "The Road Not Taken" by Robert Frost.

One last thing – I don't own anything, and I also don't make any money with this!

Now, on with it!

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Lying there on the cooling ground (wasteland or not, the night still stole the heat of the sun) of her make-believe bed, she was staring up into the sky, imagining – or at least trying to – that she was still a little girl that believed in little green men or The Man In The Moon.

Of course all the imagination in the world wouldn't make her forget that reality was something else entirely. No movie monster could rival the true evil out there; whether that evil was a stupid lunkhead, or the silver-haired devil of her nightmares; she still hadn't decided. One was a danger to her life, the other to her heart.

She knew only this: once, she was a woman with no past, no future and no memory. The only names she'd had were fabricated. Now she was Faye Valentine – the one with too much past, too many identities, and no idea which name or which personality she should take and call her own.

Should she be the daughter of rich parents, the sister of an annoyingly smug older brother and the doctor-to-be she once was?

Or would the cutthroat, make-no-prisoners, _Romani_ fit better now?

Or better yet, should she return to Poker Alice?

She had no idea.

So she kept on staring into the stars, not even moving when flared bright as the sun and then winked out of existence. The feeling that came over her then told her that she should get a move on and do something; her gut told her something terrible was about to happen and usually she went with what her gut told her.

But she couldn't bring herself to move. That star… it had been beautiful, but it had also been quite alone up there. No other near enough to reach it. Maybe it had been for the best that it was gone now. Couldn't have been much fun to always be alone.

It took her another few hours to move, and when she finally did she climbed into the Red Tail and just let instinct guide her .

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Later, she decided that her instinct always brought her more trouble than everything else. (It had made her stay with the Bounty hunters, after all). Sighing, she went into the still smoldering building wondering why there were no cops or other officials on the scene. She let the question go when she saw a half-burned away banner, sporting the symbol of the Red Dragon Syndicate.

No one in their right mind would walk into that building; but then again, Faye hat never once stated to be all that sane. No way in hell would she have stayed with that group of misfits otherwise.

Shaking her head to get her thoughts in order, she carefully walked past the dead and ignored the moans of the injured and dying. At the back of the entrance hall she found a stairwell – slightly charred, missing chunks of wall here and there, but otherwise intact enough to make it up to the top floor.

She met no living soul on her ascend and grew wary (and thought that she should have been from the beginning, but whatever, right?) of the eerie silence all around. It was like standing in the middle of a tomb.

As she finally made it to the top, she came out into another huge room, and finally found people still standing and alert. And like her, they were staring at the scene on the other end of the room.

Seemed she came just in time for the big showdown, for even as she watched, she heard Spike proclaim that Julia was gone now (well, that certainly explained the star).

What came after, was over too fast to be true. A fight like that, the end of a personal war so intimate, should take hours not mere minutes.

Still Vicious fell and didn't get up again.

And as the lunkhead made his way down the stairs – slowly, stumbling and dripping blood _everywhere_ – she knew that his dream was over. There was nothing left for her to do but go and pick up the pieces.

So when he pulled out his stupid non-humor once more, shooting _at_ nothing _with_ nothing, forcing out a silent "Bang" she couldn't help but smile. A lunkhead to the bitter end.

His mismatched eyes met hers for just a moment before he collapsed, and she knew he was free.

So she turned around and left the Syndicate to clean up after themselves and went back to the Red Tail.

She had decided who she wanted to be now. So as she sped back towards the Bebop, and conveniently forgot that she had a name before she was Faye Valentine.

As she approached the junkyard Jet called a ship, she slowed down, looking up once again; she saw another star going bright, bright, bright – and then dimming until only a barely-there light remained.

Maybe there would be another dream to be found. Maybe.

Grinning, she gunned her engines and went home, whispering under her breath.

"See you in space, Cowboy."

Xoxoxoxo

Well, I hope you enjoyed this. Maybe let me know with a little review?

So long,

Zora


End file.
